It looks like LinkedIn has progressed one more step in China after a WeChat update over the weekend revealed that the wildly-popular messaging service has integrated profiles from the career-focused social network.
The latest update to both WeChat and Weixin, the version available in China, lets users link their LinkedIn account to WeChat. This would likely help to raise the profile of LinkedIn among WeChat’s users, especially in China, given that the messaging service has an estimated 500 million plus registered users in the country alone. It has 270 million active users worldwide.
The latest development comes after LinkedIn made a move in the country earlier this month with the appointment of Derek Shen, the founder and former CEO of Chinese Groupon-like group-buying site Nuomi, as the president of LinkedIn China.
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LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman also previously acknowledged the importance of the Android ecosystem to China. We speculated that this meant we could expect LinkedIn to focus its efforts on mobile in the world’s largest smartphone market as well — and the company has delivered, albeit with a small step.
The latest WeChat update also adds real-time location sharing with its Walkie Talkie voice feature, universal search including chat history search, notifications if you are mentioned in a group chat, as well as the ability to share sticker sets with friends.
Headline image via Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
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